


A God Complex And Crippling Self Hatred Walk Into A Bar

by ironicosity



Category: Rick and Morty
Genre: Angst, Character Study, Depression, God Complex, Implied/Referenced Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, Self-Hatred
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-05
Updated: 2017-10-05
Packaged: 2019-01-09 05:56:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 987
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12270282
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ironicosity/pseuds/ironicosity
Summary: Rick is an expert at ignoring things.this is sort of a character study? i guess? on rick. like how he sees himself as the smartest best person ever, but also like....... despises himself too. i swear it's actually decent, i just can't summarize :')





	A God Complex And Crippling Self Hatred Walk Into A Bar

**Author's Note:**

> hey uhhhhh this is my first rick and morty fic so i apologize if it's actual garbage.  
> i think that, as a character, rick is super amazing. like, he's complex but also very simple? and he's very contradictory in how he portrays himself in his mind. it's like, he is his own villain and his own hero. i think it's very interesting to get into, and write through, and think about.  
> as his own self though, i obviously don't support rick or how he acts because he's a bad person and he goes about the wrong things the wrong ways. but he's the type of character that you just...... see the minuscule good in? and you root for it, even though it'll like never happen, or happen very fleetingly. love to hate, hate to love.  
> but yeah, i could go on about his characterization for a whiiiile, i love talking abt that stuff.  
> thanks for reading, i hope you enjoy !

Rick is an expert at ignoring things.

He’s certainly had enough practice in his life to call himself as such, what with all the problem-evading he’s done in the past. Running away is just a part of who he is.

He can see the irony in it (the cowardice of running coming from someone with so much  ~~ false ~~ confidence). He does pride himself in being the smartest person in literally any dimension ever, so it shouldn’t be too shocking that he can see it.

Then again, his pride hasn’t always been the best to him. It’s constantly getting in the way, and he knows he’s a contradiction. He’s the selfish one who only cares for himself, only does things for his own good and no one else’s, but at the same time, he is his own least favorite person. His own worst nightmare and mortal enemy.

He’s so acutely aware of every single fuck-up he makes. He just can’t bring himself to correct any of them. It’s pointless, he thinks, to fix something or apologize for something that you know you’re going to repeat, especially if you’re not even sorry in the first place.

He knows he should be sorry and, really, he wants to be sorry. It’s just that he really fucking isn’t anymore. He’s too tired. Life has weathered him too thoroughly for him to care about what he does.

And maybe all this knowing is part of the issue.

He knows he’s a mess, he’s an awful father and grandfather, he’s mean and calloused, and his priorities are all sorts of fucked up. He knows all of this.

The problem is that he’s not doing a single thing to change it.

He’s awful. He really is. He’s going to be awful regardless of what he does, so he figures, he might as well not even try. If every result is the same, why try a different method at all? It’s like, if it’s always going to be water, what’s the difference between H2O and OH2? The answer is, one is accepted and the other isn’t. There’s no particular reason why, not really. Some people just decided that it was.

(Actually, he speculates, it’s because of negative and positive ions. He knows this. Of course he does. Why wouldn’t he? He’s a fucking genius. He knows everything. He’s the best person alive, and everyone else is in the wrong. All the time. He’s the only one on his side. Only him.)

If every existing being in every dimension, including every single version of himself, accepts him as a piece of shit scumbag, why try not to be? He’s always going to be the same in their eyes. It doesn’t matter where the letters go anymore, because “dihydrogen monoxide” is to “water” what “Rick” is to “horrible, selfish person.”

And they’re not wrong.

Half of him wants to spit in their faces, because no one is ever as right as him. He’s only useless when he says he is, and not when anyone else says so.

(The other half, though, agrees with them.)

He’s the  ~~ most cruel, selfish, mean ~~ smartest person alive. He  ~~ destroyed everyone he loved  ~~ invented all sorts of crazy shit. He should be  ~~ killed, locked away, obliterated ~~ bathed in diamonds and redheads for as long as he lives.

He’s constantly at an impasse with his own cerebrum, and it’s starting to take (read: has always been taking) a toll on him.

And, of course, there’s the drinking. He always smells like liquor and vomit, and if you asked him to count the chunks of missing memory caused by alcohol (not that memories are the only chunks the alcohol causes), he wouldn’t be able to count them on all the cells in his body.

But now he’s gone way off topic.

The point is, he’s the master of ignoring problems. Not problems like, “I tried to break into this place and now I’m being shot at” or “These starving beast aliens are trying to consume me.” Those aren’t really the type of problems that anyone is capable of ignoring.

He’s better at ignoring the problems that matter. Like how Beth tends to always have a bottle of wine in hand, and how Morty has started flinching more and more whenever you get too close, or grab at him too quickly, or make too sudden or too loud of a noise. Like how Summer’s practically never at home, probably in an attempt to avoid the clusterfuck that she has to call her family.

The guilt he feels is indescribable (because it’s  ~~ too much to ever comprehend ~~ infinitesimal), and it gets a little bit worse when he walks down the stairs one morning (afternoon) to see Morty alone on the couch, quietly crying.

He walks into the garage and doesn’t come out for the rest of the day.

He’s fucked around with time travel enough to know that there’s not really any way to change the past. All it does is split timelines more than Morty’s skin has (not that he saw any sign of wounding on him, not that he would’ve confronted him about it if he did, which he didn’t).

The thing is, though, he’s sort of given up on changing anything at all. He can’t change who he was, so why try to change who he is, or who he will be? So what if it would be for Beth’s benefit, or for the whole family’s benefit? If they have any of Rick’s genes (which, obviously, they do), they’re bound to always be miserable. At least, this way, they’ll have someone to blame for it that isn’t themselves.

He’s the  ~~ stupidest ~~ noblest fucking person that ever existed for taking the fall like that. He’s ~~caused~~ saved them so much inner turmoil and pain by doing it. By being the villain.

He’s ~~absolutely fucking disgusting~~ practically a saint.

God, he fucking  ~~ hates ~~ loves himself.

**Author's Note:**

> i hope you enjoyed, thank you for reading !  
> all kudos/comments/critique/etc are highly appreciated  
> if you'd like, my tumblr is: ironicosity  
> have a good day !


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